Skyrim came out last month and unlike a good percentage of my friends, I didn’t buy it. I thought I would wait until the game was patched before buying it. However as the latest patch adds some pretty major bugs, I’ll be waiting a little bit longer.
So here is what I’ve been playing instead!
Battlefield 3
Aside from wanting to wait for a patch. Battlefield 3 is another reason I’ve held out on Skyrim. Battlefield 3′s multiplayer that is. I don’t often play co-op games for various reasons but the Battlefield series has always managed to be one of the few games that gets team based multiplayer right. It remains one of the best multiplayer experiences you can have on any platform. I’ve played over 90 hours of Conquest mode (0 minutes of single player!) since release day which as you can imagine, hasn’t left much time for dragon slaying.
Having a good squad to play with really makes a difference with this game. Playing with randoms can be such a mixed experience and at times can be very frustrating. Some people just don’t seem to know how to PTFO. Since I don’t have a good squad to play with, I’ll settle for these guys.
Dodonpachi Resurrection
Doo dum what? I can hear some of you saying. Dodonpachi Resurrection (Daifukkatsu) is the latest in Cave’s flagship DonPachi series of vertical scrolling shooters. It got a UK release for Xbox 360 on the same day as Skyrim. Again, the release of this game informed my decision not to buy Skyrim. Skyrim will be on the shelves for years to come, whereas fairly low profile games like this tend to disappear quite quickly. I must confess I bought it more to support the release of shmups on the 360 rather than through loyalty to Cave. The Donpachi/DoDonPachi series has never really sat right with me because of it’s very strict enemy chaining based scoring system. They’re always fun enough games to play for their own sake but trying to play for score in them just doesn’t appeal to me as much as it does in a lot of other shmups, even other Cave shmups. It’s a good game but not entirely to my taste.
The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall
This is a game I’m about to stop playing instead of Skyrim, out of sheer frustration. Daggerfall, the second in the Elder Scrolls series (to which Skyrim is the fifth) is to this day one of the most ambitious RPGs ever made. I really, really want to like this game. It’s got so much going for it but it’s so incredibly buggy even when patched and the dungeons are just appalling. Even a basic Fighter’s Guild quest can involve hours of tedious crawling through labyrinthine, randomly generated dungeons with miles of identical corridors twisting round like spaghetti. Then you fall through the floor. Again.
With a slightly heavy heart, I’ll be putting this to rest and trying another DOS roleplaying game instead. Or, if I ever get round to tidying my desk so I can use my PC, Morrowind. If you want to try Daggerfall for yourself. Bethesda are giving it away for free on their website along with the original Elder Scrolls: Arena.
I’ll get Skyrim eventually, then probably make a few posts moaning about how I can’t mix and match armour anymore. Watch this space!
